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Ariel Salzmann soon will be packing her bags and flying to Istanbul for what she describes as the chance of a lifetime.

The Queen's University history professor is the first scholar from a Canadian university to receive a senior fellowship from the Koc University Research Centre for Anatolian Studies. The fellowship lasts from mid-February until June.

"It's very prestigious because it's very restricted and it's totally international," she said. "Unlike the grants that we get here in Canada ... this is a truly international competition."

Salzmann said she is one of only a dozen scholars to be selected and she's honoured to have been chosen.

"It's becoming one of the world's centres for the study of Anatolian cultures and civilizations," said Salzmann.

Anatolia, she said, is a region rich in history. It represents "any and all cultures" that have lived in the peninsula we now call Turkey, including Troy and Catal Hoyuk, which she described as one of the oldest sites ever to be excavated.

Each applicant had to submit a project proposal to be considered for the fellowship, said Salzmann.

Salzmann's project focuses on the way the Roman Catholic Church dealt with having a Muslim society close by in the Mediterranean.

"I've been working on trying to understand how the Catholic Church responded to, basically, the challenge of multiculturalism next door," she said.

Salzmann said studying Middle Eastern languages and culture while completing her bachelor's degree at University of Massachusetts sparked her interest in Turkish history.

Now she teaches Islamic and world history at Queen's, where she was the first Middle Eastern history professor at the university.

Salzmann said she's optimistic the fellowship will "forge linkages that have never really existed before" between scholars at Queen's and Koc, which she hopes will make it easier for Queen's students to study there.

Although she won't be working with other scholars on her project, she said they will provide her with feedback on her presentations, and she's excited for this kind of collaboration.

"That's the way these kinds of relationships are built," she said.

"They're formed by many strands and this is one of them."

Salzmann said she's happy to jump into the hustle and bustle of Istanbul.